Richard Hammond - Bioinnovation

Product development at the intersection of biology, engineering and computation. Biosensors and measurement systems for biology. Understanding the interplay between biotechnology, economics and regulations and how this impacts business strategy.

How long have you worked at Cambridge Consultants?

In total 10 years in two 5-year periods – once as a graduate engineer, then returned 15 years later as a Director.

What are your individual responsibilities?

Building CC’s bioinnovation business on both supply and demand side:

Supply: developing CC’s biological capabilities both staff and facilities (labs), making sure we can execute biology within projects

Engaging with clients and learning new ideas and approaches. Our bioinnovation campaign is built around synthetic biology and I never tire of hearing the new things people are doing. Delivering real-world answers. Getting any technology – particularly biotechnology – from the lab into the hands of users so it helps them is hard, when you do it the buzz is immense.

Tell us about some of your achievements.

Developing the Abbott ID Now and getting it to market. This was the world’s first CLIA Waived point-of-care molecular diagnostic and is now playing a key part in managing the current COVID-19 pandemic.

Building CC’s bioinnovation business over the last five years. We started with an idea; we’re now working with some of the most innovative biotech companies in the world. We really have managed to get biologists and engineers working together.

What excites you about bioinnovation?

Working with biology really does give us the opportunity to address some of the most significant issues in the world today – climate change, food supply, improved healthcare and environmental remediation.

The overlap between biology, engineering and computation gives rise to so many possibilities. Hearing a biologist saying ‘I’ll design a primer’ was a revelation to me years ago in the diagnostics world. The rate of development and progress in the field of biotechnology today and how this is translating into new products is truly exciting.